Do you believe that murderers or rapists are worse people? In real life? How about in fiction?

Poll - Total Votes: 5

Murderers are worse people in real life, as well as worse people in fiction.

Rapists are worse people in real life, as well as worse people in fiction.

Murderers are worse people in real life, but rapists are worse people in fiction.

Rapists are worse people in real life, but murderers are worse people in fiction.

You can only vote on one answer.

Murderers and rapists... hands down the worst people on Earth, even worse if their victims are children. But the question that's been on my mind is which is worse?

Murder is technically worse as it means the person who was killed is gone and never coming back but rape is generally treated as worse and gets a stronger visceral sense of disgust from people.

I guess part of the reason is rape victims are alive to talk about their experience but obviously the same can't be true for murder victims.

In fiction however rapists are 100% treated as worse than murderers without a shadow of a doubt. Murderer characters are often redeemed A LOT meanwhile rapist characters are basically written as irredeemable pieces of shit with zero positive qualities.

My personal opinion would be that murderers are worse people in real life, but rapists are worse people in fiction.

And by the way the reason I didn't include a "both are equally bad regardless if real life or fiction" option is because in questions/polls like this answers along the lines of "equally" or "all of them" or "none of them" or whatever are just such cop out answers lol.

To me the point of a poll like this to make it fun and/or interesting is to make you think hard and carefully choose between two or more equally shitty options and an answer like "equally bad" just feels like such a lazy cop out answer.

If you do end up saying equally bad I wouldn't complain but I would prefer you not answer because that's not my goal here.

Rabscuttle · 41-45

I can explain the depiction- but believe me, you're not going to like it.

Murder's awfulness is obvious, but why is rape considered so horrific? More to the point, why is rape considered so much more horrific than other forms of physical attack? Why was John Bobbit the subject of mockery and laughter while Christine Blasey Ford was held up as a pillar of moral courage? Society- ALL human societies- have different levels of empathy for men and women, and extremely low levels of honesty about the double standards. And rape is usually perceived as, sometimes legally defined as- a crime with exclusively female victims, and almost exclusively male perpetrators.

In 1993, the Kansas Supreme Court, in the case of Hermesmann v. Seyer, ruled that Shane Seyer would be required to make child support payments to Colleen Hermesmann. It WAS his child, but there was a problem: Shane wasn't legally allowed to work in the US. Because he was an illegal immigrant? No, because he was twelve. Colleen was sixteen. She'd been his babysitter, and the two of them had found an unusual, but very old-fashioned, way to pass the time.

Wait a minute, you think, wouldn't that be statuatory rape? Yes. Yes, it would- in fact, it WAS, but the court ruled that that didn't matter, because Shane didn't complain about it to his parents. No, I'm not kidding; rape of a child isn't rape unless the kid complains- unless, of course, the kid is female. If you question why on Earth Colleen would sue Shane, when it would expose her to criminal charges, destroy her reputation, and stand to gain her basically nothing, she didn't- the state sued on her behalf.

In simpler terms, the state of Kansas threatened to send a child to prison for being unable to make court-ordered support payments TO HIS RAPIST. And if you think that this ruling only applies somewhere as backwards as Kansas, well, you'd be correct- but in the aftermath of the case, seventeen other states passed laws mandating the same policies. I defy you to find me an example anywhere, at any time of a woman facing the same penalty. If you think that it only applies in the US, you'd again be correct- but in other places, things are WORSE; the UK, for example, doesn't even acknowledge female rapists, as their laws require sexual penetration, so unless she busts out a dildo and goes to town on you, she's in the clear, legally. This is why rape statistics are so lopsided, gender-wise, in such places; women rape far less because they're not anatomically able to, and require mechanical assistance. Similar laws are common all over the world; I suggest not looking into them unless you've got something psychologically reassuring nearby, though, as it gets very depressing VERY fast.

They also apply if the victim is female- this isn't just ignoring male victims. Female perpetrators dodging accountability is other side of it, and if Victimhood Points can be gained at the same time, so much the better. Look at the furor around the Clancy case if you doubt me; the thought of holding a woman accountable for murdering her children is anathema to a frankly appalling number of people.

If you doubt the importance of the Victimhood Points (I capitalize the phrase because it's a religion to such people; the doctrine of "it's better to be a victim than an oppressor"- as though they were the only two options, or even mutually exclusive!- has long since given way to "it's better to be a victim than to NOT be a victim"), consider that in the West, almost universally, women have legal protections against infant genital mutilation, government battle slavery, discrimination in employment and housing, and being forced into parenthood against their will; men have NONE of those things, and yet are still widely seen as "oppressors", despite the lack of ANY rights exclusive to them (the only exception that I've found being public toplessness, and that only in a few places). And yet, the lack of empathy is so severe that raising said objections almost never gets you anything beyond being called a misogynist (this comment will probably get some responses saying as much; this sentence won't stop them, because they won't read this far).

So rape, in society's eyes, gives you the perfect storm: the preferred victim group, the designated perpetrator group, and socially if not legally, no potential overlap between them. It's the only reason rape is, or even COULD BE, seen as comparable to murder, let alone worse. Don't get me wrong, it's truly a horrendous thing, among the worst that a person can do- but murder is far, far worse. You can recover from psychological damage; you can't recover from death.

EzraIsShy76028 · 22-25

@greensnacks Some honestly. Though the issue arises for people who have been falsely accused. Some people were found out to be innocent and falsely accused after they already got killed by the death sentence. But if there's video footage and footprints and everything then the proof is basically 100% and the death sentence could/should be applied.

myfaithischristian · 36-40, F

Rape is worst think if you were a sweet little innocent baby and this happened to you and you couldnt handle it so you died how would that make you feel

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